The Sweet Sounds Of Really Bad Singing

By KELEFA SANNEH

Published: January 18, 2004

LAST week, the eighth-most-popular song in the country was ''Slow Jamz,'' a ruthlessly addictive ode to make-out music. In his verses, the mile-a-minute Chicago rapper Twista pays tribute to great crooners: he offers to ''Get ya sheets wet/ Listening to Keith Sweat,'' he promises to ''put you in a daze with Maze,'' and you can probably guess that he has no trouble finding a rhyme for Teddy Pendergrass.

Like many hip-hop hits, this one has as much singing as rapping, including an ingenious Luther Vandross sample and a surprisingly sweet chorus from the actor and comedian Jamie Foxx. But the best part is the first verse, where the producer turned rapper Kanye West croons crude come-ons, struggling to hit the notes. This is what makes the song so irresistible: it's a not-very-smooth celebration of smoothness, a ridiculous tribute to the sublime.

Welcome to the golden age of un-golden throats: ''Slow Jamz'' is only the latest example of the bad-singing boom that has produced one great pop song after another over the last year or so. From 50 Cent to Pharrell, from Ashanti to André 3000, the pop chart has been overrun with singers who have learned how to flaunt their imperfections.

It would be easy to think of reasons that this odd trend is bad news. No doubt some listeners still wince when high notes are flat, or when ad-libs veer disastrously off-key. But the best badly sung songs make such objections seem like so much pedantry: it's hard to hold a grudge when Mr. West is howling, ''I'm-a play this Vandross/ You gon' take your pants off.'' For a nation still entranced by the big-voiced stars of ''American Idol,'' this may be the perfect antidote: a deluge of audacious pop songs, sung by people who might never have made it past the show's auditions.

Whenever someone wants to play down the importance of vocal virtuosity, Bob Dylan is Exhibit A: a brilliant croaker who makes you feel sorry for all those hacks content to simply carry a tune. But for precisely that reason, Mr. Dylan isn't really a bad singer. He's got an unconventional voice, to be sure (has anyone else noticed that he is sounding more and more like Scooby Doo?), but he's too idiosyncratic, too rock 'n' roll. A great bad singer must never give up on goodness. Perhaps Mr. West knows how preposterous he sounds, but he's still singing the best he can.

I'd propose that the father of modern bad singing is Biz Markie, the rapper best known for the classic anti-love song ''Just a Friend,'' from 1989. His bellowed plea -- wildly out of tune, and totally unforgettable -- sounded like something concocted after a day of romantic disappointments and a night of heavy drinking: ''Oh baby, you/ You got what I need/ But you say he's just a friend.'' With each repetition of the chorus, he sounded funnier and more unhinged.

Biz Markie's most direct descendant is Lumidee, the young R & B singer behind one of 2003's biggest and best and strangest hits, ''Never Leave (Uh Ooh Uh Ooh).'' It had an appealing beat and a catchy chorus, but what really made it stand out was her unusual vocal style. Lumidee told an MTV interviewer, ''I don't have such a strong voice, but it's different.''

That's putting it mildly. On ''Never Leave,'' she could have been one of those melody-challenged ''American Idol'' contestants who gets interrupted mid-verse by Simon Cowell. Except there was no one to stop her, so she blithely sang it all the way through, often departing from the tune entirely. By the end, it was hard not to admire her audacity, and harder still not to join in: those out-of-reach notes sounded like an invitation to do better, or to make fun, or just to sing along.

You can hear a similar -- but less extreme -- approach on ''The Love Below'' (Arista), André 3000's half of the new OutKast album. He's obviously obsessed with Prince, and he's not about to let his less-than-Princely voice get in the way. The effect is disarming: his slightly wobbly sense of pitch gives the whole disc an appealing, woozy feel; when he reaches for a high note and comes up short, it's a welcome reminder that he doesn't take himself too seriously.

50 Cent's ''Get Rich or Die Tryin' '' (Shady/Aftermath/Interscope), the best-selling album of 2003, was also full of proudly amateurish singing. Instead of teaming up with R & B singers, the way rappers used to, he delivered his own choruses, slurring and sneering the words without burying the tunes. This was a clever way to make the album hummable without making it sound slick or commercial -- perhaps 50 Cent learned this strategy from his executive producer Eminem, who did some un-slick singing of his own on his 2002 album ''The Eminem Show.''

Sometimes, a not-so-strong voice acts as a leash, forcing singers to stick to simple melodies. That's why critics who complain about Ashanti's modest vocal gifts are missing the point: she's no gospel roarer, and that's one reason her songs tend to be so straightforward; her current single, ''Breakup 2 Makeup,'' may not be quite pitch-perfect, but it's catchy and casual in a way louder, more histrionic songs never are.